She held her little slim hand out for it, her face sparkling. His were the long, slender, square-tipped fingers of the typical "surgeon's hand," smooth and strong. But Joy's hands were little for her build, which was not large, and the ring slid down her engagement finger till she had to anchor it with a little gold band from the other hand, pushed down over it. "I'll take very good care of it, and polish it before I give it back to you," she assured him. He answered her on a sudden boyish impulse. "I don't want you to give it back to me. You're to keep it.... It can be your wishing ring that you said I brought you, Joy." She smiled down at it, loose on her finger. "Why, so it is--my wishing ring!" she sighed happily. She turned it about her finger, and he saw her lips move. She was wishing. He wondered what, but she did not offer to tell him. "I wish that he may have the thing he wants the very most in all the world," she was saying fervently under her breath. When she was done she rose from the leaves, and he sprang up beside her. "There's one more ceremony," he told her, half-amusedly. "Even for a four days' engagement, to make it _quite_ legal--" He bent toward her, smiling. "Oh--oh, should we?" stammered Joy, her wild-rose color deepening to rose-red. "I really think we should," said John solemnly. It was the nearest to teasing any one he had come for a long time, and he found himself rather enjoying it. Besides, in his heart lurked the feeling that the child ought to realize that she might have let herself in for a good deal, if she hadn't fallen into merciful hands. He was a little ashamed of himself at the sweet way she took it. She merely held herself quite still and serious, and lifted her face a little. John was a young man who always went through with anything he had begun, and he bent over and kissed Joy, very lightly. "I'm sorry," he said. "I--I didn't mind," said Joy, trying to make him happy, for she saw he was sorry, though she didn't know why or what for. "You dear child!" he said. "Well, I won't do it again. I was teasing you, and I shouldn't. Come, we ought to go now." She fell into step beside him, still mystified, but very much obliged to him in general, and they went back to the bungalow and congratulations side by side. Meanwhile two very much surprised young people confronted two still perturbed old ones in the sunset on Phyllis' veranda. "Now _why_ do you suppose," Allan demanded of the world in general, "Johnny didn't break the news to us? I've rarely known a man who liked secrets less. He hasn't even come over and looked radiant with his mouth shut, as a normal human being would." Phyllis picked up Angela and gazed over her head as she considered. She had a way of using Angela as most women do knitting or embroidery: as something to have in her hands when she wanted to think. "It was certainly a case of very silent emotion," she said contemplatively.